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19 January 2015

Tip of the Week! Finding UN Documents

I just learned a nifty way to quickly search for UN documents online. All you do is append the document symbol of the item you're seeking to this base URL: http://undocs.org/

Here's an example: I was looking for the document, "Compilation and Analysis of Legal Norms," which carries the symbol: E/CN.4/1996/52/Add.2.

As per the instructions above, I created the following new URL -- http://undocs.org/E/CN.4/1996/52/Add.2 -- which I then entered into my web browser, and voila! Note that the language version of the document defaults to English, but other available language options are displayed in a header running across the top of the screen.

Ultimately, this search serves as a short-cut way to locate documents housed in the UN's Official Document System (ODS). Which means that if a document is not actually available in the ODS, the strategy won't work. This may be because a document is older and has not yet been scanned. Another time I came up empty-handed is when I searched for http://undocs.org/A/69/CRP.1, which happens to be a very recent document: the Recommended Principles and Guidelines on Human Rights at International Borders. So perhaps Conference Room Papers are not included in the ODS either.